BBC faces revolt over plans to move programmes including Question Time

The BBC is facing a revolt from staff after announcing plans to move
production of many of its most popular programmes - including Question Time,
Casualty and Crimewatch - away from their traditional bases in England.

David Dimbleby, the presenter of Question Time, threatening to quit

By Andrew Pierce, Neil Midgley and Nicole Martin

7:33PM BST 15 Oct 2008

The plans were announced by the BBC's director of television, Jana Bennett, and will see a huge increase in the number of programmes made in the devolved nations of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

David Dimbleby, the presenter of Question Time, is understood to have expressed "dismay" to BBC executives over their decision to move production of Question Time to Scotland.

The Daily Telegraph has learned that he may quit the programme in protest at the BBC's decision, which will see the flagship current affairs show made at the BBC's new Glasgow headquarters, Pacific Quay.

The move is scheduled for 2010, the year in which Alex Salmond, the Scottish Nationalist Party leader, is expected to hold a referendum on independence. The three main political parties have joined Mr Dimbleby in expressing astonishment at the decision.

A senior BBC source said: "In my view it is about as politically inept as it gets to move the most popular British political programme to Scotland which is riven with nationalist fervour."

If the Scots vote for independence the programme would have to be brought back or produced in a country which has cut off all links with Westminster.

Mr Dimbleby, who has presented the programme since 1994, was not available for comment last night.

Ms Bennett's plans have also caused an outcry in Bristol, which is set to lose returning hospital drama Casualty to a new production base in Cardiff.

The show, which has been based in Bristol since its inception in 1986, is estimated to contribute £10million to the city's economy.

In her speech to the Royal Television Society, Ms Bennett trumpeted the BBC's commitment to "build Wales as a centre of excellence for drama". However one Bristol TV insider suspected that "the real reason is that they can get away with paying a lot of the crew pitiful wages in Wales".

Gerry Morrissey, the general secretary of the broadcasting union Bectu, supported the moves away from London.

However, he expressed dismay that the BBC staff affected would receive a less generous relocation package than those involved in the BBC's previously announced move of some services to Salford.

The controversy threatens to engulf the arts strand Imagine, game show Weakest Link and long-running police show Crimewatch, all of which will move to either Scotland or Wales.

It came on the same day as the row over the future funding of the BBC deepened, with the corporation's chairman, Sir Michael Lyons, trading blows with his opposite number at the broadcasting regulator, Ofcom, Lord David Currie.

In an Ofcom report last month, the watchdog suggested that one way of funding loss-making programmes on ITV and Channel 4 - such as regional news and Dispatches - would be to "top slice" the licence fee and give some of the money to other broadcasters.

Sir Michael fiercely defended the corporation's monopoly over the licence fee, and said that Ofcom proposals for potentially transferring the revenue of the BBC's commercial arm, BBC Worldwide, were "extraordinary".

"If I was naive I might be surprised that top-slicing remains an option: it holds next-to-no support from within the industry and Ofcom's own research shows that 63 per cent of the public would rather have their money back when given the choice over how the current digital switchover funding might be used if it was continued beyond 2012," said Sir Michael.

However, in what appeared to be a thinly veiled dig at the BBC's vocal defence of its current funding arrangements, Lord Currie called on the Government to consider "dispassionately" Ofcom's proposal to carve up the licence fee.

National Union of Journalist official Paul McLaughlin added: "We welcome more guarantees for the nations but it remains to be seen how much of the benefit is real and how much will go on travelling on rail and planes."